The Sculptor

Markham checked the time in the corner of his computer screen-would have to leave soon if he was going to make the meeting in Boston. He was torn; he felt like he needed to stay in Providence-just knew that the answer to catching The Michelangelo Killer was right there on his desk, right there in the book in his briefcase. But Markham also knew he needed Cathy; and Christ was he tired-couldn’t think straight. He had slept for only a couple of hours in his office between working on his computer and reading over and over again the printouts from Boston and Quantico. He had spoken to Cathy before drifting off-had whispered her to sleep with “I miss you” and “I’ll see you tomorrow” instead of the three words he had really wanted to say-those three words he had not said to another woman since the death of his Michelle. They had slept together in the same bed only once in the two weeks since they first made love at Cathy’s East Side condo, stealing kisses and passionate exchanges here and there when the coast was clear at the safe house. If Bill Burrell and his team knew about his affair with Cathy Hildebrant, if they thought it improper, they weren’t saying. And to be honest, Sam Markham didn’t give a shit if the whole fucking Federal Bureau of Investigation knew. No, in the two weeks since he first began to admit to himself his love for Cathy Hildebrant, Markham began to feel more and more that he was working not for them, but for her.

The only e-mail Sam Markham chose to open that morning was from Rachel Sullivan. He responded with a short Yes to her question as to whether or not he wanted to donate to the fund she was organizing for the slain officer’s families. She was a good egg, that Sullivan, and a damn fine agent-would soon be a SAC herself, Markham thought; she was doing a bang-up job of scraping the shit from the toilet bowl that was South Providence. No doubt she would be giving a presentation today on her missing persons report-had already informed Markham that, after weeding through the databases, she was presently working with a list of at least eight names of prostitutes who were known to have disappeared from the Rhode Island area in the last six years, and whose circumstances might tie them to The Michelangelo Killer.

Eight, Markham had said to himself. How many are The Sculptor’s? And how many others went unreported?

Markham felt his stomach knot at the thought of The Michelangelo Killer going shopping for material on the streets of South Providence like it was Wal-Mart. But a smart place to buy, Markham thought-a typical hunting ground for serial killers because so many of their victims go unnoticed. But whereas Markham knew that most serial killers hunted out of the need to satisfy some kind of selfish sexual or psychological urge, he also knew that The Sculptor only hunted out of a need for supplies.

“Put me down for 500,” Markham added in his e-mail, and then shut down his computer.

Five hundred dollars, he said to himself. Two hundred and fifty each for their lives. Pathetic.

At that moment, Markham would have given his whole salary to the policemen’s widows. But at the same time he understood that anything more than his five hundred dollars would make him and the FBI look guilty. He had attended the double funeral that week-actually wept when he saw the slain policemen’s children place their flowers on their fathers’ caskets. In hindsight, it had been foolish for the FBI to put out an APB-foolish to unleash the cunning Sculptor on a couple of unsuspecting locals.

But then again, two weeks ago, how could the FBI have known what they were really dealing with?

A killing machine, Markham thought. Built like the fucking Terminator, and who won’t stop until he finds his man.

Yes, as vivid as were those teenage memories of Arnold Schwarzenegger blasting his way through the streets of LA in pursuit of Sarah Connor, Special Agent Sam Markham could see so clearly the man for whom The Sculptor would be searching next-a dark and grainy movie in his mind, in which a ski-masked Terminator chased a marble white statue through the streets of downtown Providence.

A movie starring Michelangelo’s David.

Chapter 37

The plan from the beginning had always been David, but it was the Pietà that had inspired him to actually start working-yes, the Pietà around which the development of his skills had evolved. And so, that it should have been the Pietà that ended up causing him so much trouble bothered The Sculptor greatly.